Search results for "NEUROSCIENCE"

Differential effects of MDMA and cocaine on inhibitory avoidance and object recognition tests in rodents.

2017

Introduction Drug addiction continues being a major public problem faced by modern societies with different social, health and legal consequences for the consumers. Consumption of psychostimulants, like cocaine or MDMA (known as ecstasy) are highly prevalent and cognitive and memory impairments have been related with the abuse of these drugs. Aim The aim of this work was to review the most important data of the literature in the last 10 years about the effects of cocaine and MDMA on inhibitory avoidance and object recognition tests in rodents. Development: The object recognition and the inhibitory avoidance tests are popular procedures used to assess different types of memory. We compare th…

Relationships between adipose tissues and brain: what do we learn from animal studies?

2010

International audience; Over the last decades, more and more data supporting the importance of the relationships between the brain and adipose tissues (white and brown) in regards of body weight regulation and energy homeostasis have been published. Indeed the brain via the autonomic nervous system participates to the regulation of different parameters such as the metabolic (lipolysis, lipogenesis and thermogeneis), and secretory (leptin and other adipokines) activities but also plasticity (proliferation differentiation and apoptosis) of adipose tissues. In turn the various fat pads will send information via sensory innervation of white adipose tissue as well as metabolic and hormonal signa…

Cytoskeleton mediates negative inotropism and lusitropism of chromogranin A-derived peptides (human vasostatin1-78 and rat CgA(1-64)) in the rat heart

2010

Cytoskeleton scaffold in cardiac myocytes provides structural support and compartmentalization of intracellular components. It is implicated in cardiac pathologies including hypertrophy and failure, playing a key role in the determinism of contractile and diastolic dysfunctions. Chromogranin A (CgA) and its derived peptides have revealed themselves as novel cardiovascular modulators. In humans, normal CgA levels considerably increase in several pathologies, including heart failure. Recent data have shown on the unstimulated rat heart that human recombinant Vasostatin-1 (hrVS-1) and rat chromogranin A 1-64 (rCgA(1-64)) induce negative inotropic and lusitropic effects counteracting the beta-a…

Is there a critical tissue oxygen tension for bioenergetic status and cellular pH regulation in solid tumors?

1996

Bioenergetic and metabolic status have been correlated with tissue oxygenation in murine fibrosarcomas (FSaII) of varying sizes (44-600 mm3). Ratios of beta-nucleoside triphosphates to inorganic phosphate (beta NTP/P) and phosphocreatine to inorganic phosphate (PCr/P(i)) ratios derived from 31P nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy (NMR) were positively correlated to median tissue O2 tension (pO2) values using O2-sensitive needle electrodes. pH declined during growth with intracellular acidosis being evident in tumors350 mm3. Whereas lactic acid formation greatly contributed to this decline in small and medium-sized tumors, adenosine triphosphate (ATP) hydrolysis and slowing down of the a…

Botulinum toxin for the treatment of somatic tinnitus

2007

Subjective tinnitus is an auditory sensation experienced in the absence of external or internal acoustic stimuli. It causes significant morbidity and can progress to a chronic debilitating condition. Somatic tinnitus is tinnitus that can be modulated by stimulation of the somatic sensory system. It occurs because of interactions between the auditory and the somatosensory system that may occur at several levels of the central nervous system. In the present chapter, we discuss how botulinum toxin can improve tinnitus and discuss the mechanism of its action, and how it relates to its effects on chronic pain.

Evaluation of the Department of Neurosurgery of the Seoul National University Hospital

2013

The Department of Neurosurgery (DNS) of the Seoul National University Hospital (SNUH), belongs to the largest and oldest such institutions in Korea. Because of its growing reputation it is hardly surprising that the DNS draws visitor and scholars for clinical education and academic exchange from far beyond Korea. I myself visited the SNUH in February and March 2013. During this time I composed this evaluation in which I compare the DNS to my home Department at the Johannes Gutenberg-University in Mainz/Germany, as well as the situation of Neurosurgery in Korea and Germany in general. In the first part this evaluation summarizes data concerning equipment, staff and organizational structure, …

Glucose plus choline improve passive avoidance behaviour and increase hippocampal acetylcholine release in mice.

2001

The present study tests the effects of glucose and choline, the biosynthetic precursors of acetylcholine, on passive avoidance behaviour and hippocampal acetylcholine release measured by microdialysis in awake mice. Glucose (10 and 30mg/kg) or choline chloride (6-60mg/kg), given by i.p. injection immediately after training, dose-dependently enhanced retention in an inhibitory avoidance task. Combinations of low doses of glucose (10mg/kg) and choline chloride (20mg/kg) which alone were submaximally effective significantly increased retention latencies in a synergistic manner, an effect which was sensitive to atropine (0.5mg/kg). This beneficial effect vanished when higher doses of glucose or…

2019

OBJECTIVE With a combination of different sympathetic tests, we aimed to elucidate whether impairment of sympathetic function in Parkinson's disease (PD) is the consequence of a central or peripheral efferent dysfunction. METHODS Thirty-five patients with early-to-intermediate PD (median age: 63 years; IQR: 57-67 years; disease duration 1-9 years, 15 women) and 20 age- and sex-matched healthy controls (median age: 64.5 years; IQR: 58-68 years; 10 women) were recruited. Autonomic testing was performed in two subgroups and included the assessment of resting cardiovascular parameters, postprandial hypotension (PPH), orthostatic hypotension (OH), and vasoconstriction induced by intradermal micr…

Serotonergic modulation of hippocampal acetylcholine release after long-term neuronal grafting

2000

Adult female rats sustained aspirative fimbria-fornix lesions and, 2 weeks later, received intrahippocampal grafts of fetal septal or mixed septal-raphe cell suspensions. Twenty-four months later, the extracellular concentration of hippocampal acetylcholine (ACh) was determined by microdialysis. Basal ACh levels (5-65 fmol/5 microl sham-operated rats) were strongly reduced after lesioning (3-7 fmol/5 microl). In septally transplanted and septal-raphe co-transplanted rats, hippocampal ACh concentrations were restored to near-normal levels (15-25 fmol/5 microl), indicating long-term functional survival of hippocampal transplants. After administration of citalopram (100 microM by infusion) and…

TREATMENT WITH SILDENAFIL PREVENTS IMPAIRMENT OF LEARNING IN RATS BORN TO PRE-ECLAMPTIC MOTHERS

2010

Pre-eclampsia is an important hypertensive pregnancy disorder and a main cause of maternal and fetal morbidity and mortality Children born from mothers with preeclampsia may present cognitive deficits The mechanisms leading to this cognitive impairment remain unclear and no treatments to improve it have been tested Pre-eclampsia is associated with impaired regulation of the nitric oxide 3 5 guanosine monophosphate cyclic (cGMP) pathway, which modulates some cognitive functions We hypothesized that alterations in the NO-cGMP pathway would be involved in the mechanisms leading to cognitive impairment in rats born to pre-eclamptic mothers and that treatment with sildenafil an inhibitor of the …